Pain au Chocolat Adventure at Home

I am so fortunate and blessed that my school has such fabulous equipment!  I have been so spoiled by things like proof boxes, sheeters, convection ovens etc.

When I decided to tackle making croissant dough for pain au chocolat at my parents house while I was home over Christmas break, I somehow forgot that I would be making them sans proof box, sheeter, etc. Needless to say, my Pain au Chocolat adventure was much more adventurous than I expected!

One piece of equipment from school that I forgot I would have in North Dakota is an extremely large, cold walk in freezer (aka our screened in porch).  How wonderful! Any time I needed to have something chill rapidly, I'd just put it on the porch and chill rapidly it would (the temperature highs haven't even been above 0 F, so things are really, really cold).

Although they're not as great as the product made it school, I consider this adventure a success!  And I'm pretty sure my friends and family who "sampled" them agree too :)

Even my dog, Mollie, was curious, especially since the baking process filled the house with the scent of delicious European butter, and Mollie loves butter!  When she was a puppy, she somehow ended up eating a stick of butter (or maybe just a portion of one) and since then has been obsessed with the smell of butter.  At least she has good taste :)